Valour
by cricketchick1990
Summary: He didn't pull the trigger...but he might as well have.


_Well this is certainly new territory for me. Alex Rider…hmmm - I'm branching out!_

_So this is my first Alex Rider fic, though I've been following the books and fandom for a fair while now. Good times._

_So here's a bit of a one-shot for you all to look at, and I hope you all have the time to leave a review!_

_Oh, by the way - as much as I'd like Alex to be my bitch, I believe that it's called child molestation and is severely frowned upon in most countries. So therefore, he can't be mine._

_But anyway, on with the fic!_

* * *

Tom Harris had never been a particularly brave or smart kid - or teenager.

Stupid maybe, reckless, but never brave. And certainly never all that clever.

That was Alex.

_Was._

It had taken the death of his best friend - which of course, with Alex, should have involved lots of gun slinging, a flying car, a poisonous snake or two somewhere along the line and a secret world crime organisation (though in reality it was only a bit of gun pointing from an extremely lucky amateur assassin) - to make him realise what a stupid coward he had been for most of the eighteen years of his life.

He'd never had to really stand up for himself, not with Alex around. Alex had taken care of anyone that wanted a fight - he was the one trained for it anyway. And Tom had sat on the sidelines, watching from afar as Alex risked injury just for him.

He'd never done the same for Alex.

Not even when the rest of their year were whispering about Alex's reasons for being away, which ranged from being on drugs, to being in a gang, to being in prison or sometimes even being some kind of male prostitute (that one had Alex in fits on his bedroom floor when Tom told him).

And while Alex usually laughed them all off, Tom knew that it was hurting him to not be able to tell them the truth, to drag his name out of the mud. It hurt him too, but he never did anything about it - he wasn't quick enough to come up with a response and despite the training Alex had been starting to put him through so that he could defend himself properly, he had no muscle to back it up. Each time he went to open his mouth, he chickened out for fear of spilling Alex's secrets and ruining everything.

Even so, they were still close mates and when Tom's parent's split and he was being fought over in an all out custody war, he spent months at Alex's, and settled straight into the way of life there - even if Alex wasn't home all the time and it was just Jack and Tom. Which was never very fun because Jack spent all of her time worrying about Alex and ended up throwing plates at walls in random fits of rage at MI6 and the government system.

He had still been living there when it happened.

They'd been hanging out after school as usual, waiting for the later bus so that they could travel home with Jack, trying to avoid the topic of exams and universities and eating copious amounts of junk food. The streets were busy, and there was nowhere to sit and catch up on Alex's latest mission without being heard - so they went up onto the roof of the building next to the Royal and General. It was fairly easy to get to, though required a fair amount of climbing up unused fire escapes along the back of the building, but they knew the area well enough now to make it without any trouble. And with the 'bank' next door, it was fairly secure so there would be no interruptions.

They sat and talked for ages, Tom listening to Alex's retelling of submarines and deep sea diving with almost longing - though he knew he would never be able to walk into a situation where a man three times your size was holding a upgraded version of an electrified cow prod and somehow manage to come out alive.

He was in the middle of his sixth question when Alex suddenly tensed, and threw himself across the concrete at him. There was a bang, and something seared across the side of his head, then Alex was ripped off of him by a man twice Tom's size, and held in place by a hand against his throat and a gun pointing to his chest. How Alex had known there was a threat hidden in the dimming light and noisy background of the city was something he would never know, but then again he had been trained to recognise things out of the ordinary, and this definitely was not ordinary.

Ordinary didn't involve guns and foreign looking men in combat suits.

There were words spoken, but in a language that Tom didn't understand - though it was most likely Spanish, seeing how quickly and fluently Alex had answered. It made him wonder briefly why he had never payed attention in that particular class - because then he might know wether or not he might die.

The gun moved away from Alex's chest to be waved nonchalantly in the air, and the hand holding Alex's throat tightened until he finally nodded frantically and the gun returned to it's position over his heart. He was gasping out words now, English and Spanish, but the pain in Tom's head was increasing and there was blood all over the ground and it was all he could do to lift his head, let alone decipher their meaning.

How the gunman didn't notice him move over the stream of expletives coming out of his mouth at a smartass comment in English that Tom somehow managed to pick up was beyond him, but Alex's eyes widened a fraction as he met his gaze and there was a desperate plea in them that Tom would never had thought he would need to see.

Alex was _scared._

He froze. And in those seconds of hesitation the trigger was pulled. Time slowed, as he watched his friend fall to the concrete and the gunman disappear into the night - carelessly thinking that Tom was already dead.

_God._

If only he had had the guts to move, to obey the look in Alex's eyes that was silently pleading for him to do something, _anything_.

He was there. He was mobile - though only just - and he could have done something. He _should _have done something, he _should _have saved him. It wouldn't have been difficult, all he had to do was to create a distraction so that Alex could break free. It was all he would have needed, what with the careless actions of the assassin. A yell, a sudden movement, _anything. _A few seconds to take control, to turn the tables.

But he couldn't. Christ, he couldn't. He froze…he couldn't even think, let alone _move_...and his best friend died because of it.

He hadn't pulled the trigger.

But he might as well have.

* * *

_Well, there's my first ever Alex Rider fic!! Well, oneshot. What did you think?_

_Hope you have the time to leave a review!!_


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